Long, Strange Trip: Vegas and the Grand Canyon

8/1

We woke up at 9, I would’ve slept later but we had three hours until checkout and I wanted to make the most of the time we had left. My mom went out searching for breakfast shortly after everyone awoke. Breakfast in the hotel was very expensive so Carol walked a decent ways away to the nearest Walgreens. It was a very artificial breakfast with a lot of donuts and honey buns but the yogurt parfaits were a nice touch. As soon as breakfast was over we headed to the pools. The final hour and a half in the pool consisted of a melee between Dad, Paul, Finn and I with the sides switching constantly. I wondered what other people were thinking as they saw us all wrestling in such a fancy pool but I was having too much fun to care. Mom and I went up earlier than everyone else and I took a nice bath in the Jacuzzi tub with jets. Time rolled by and the rest of our family failed to show up. When I finally heard the frantic knocks of Finn it was 11:45, fifteen minutes to check out. To their credit the kids washed up fairly quickly, my dad was content with his chlorine bath and declined to clean up, no surprise there. It was a bittersweet departure. The hotel was amazing no one would want to leave but we knew we would be seeing many more incredible things. Lunch was at a “Sonic”, another chain we do not have on the East Coast. I had always wanted to go. We probably wouldn’t have gone except my mom had seen one on the way in and insisted we stop there because of the old school drive-in style. It was a very cool experience and the food was good but finally we were leaving Vegas. It was a four hour drive to the Grand Canyon and I drove the last two. When we got to the visitor center, to our surprise, it was closed but we looked at a board showing the hikes available and we made our plan for the next day. We were only a short walk from the canyon rim so we headed in that direction when a torrential downpour began. We rushed to the car to get our raincoats. Finn had walked ahead and when the rain came could not find the car. He was left outside while the rest of us huddled in the car for the ten minute rain. After the rain subsided, we eventually found him and continued on to our hike around the Rim of the Canyon to Mather’s Point. There were many observation areas near the visitor center and my first sight of the gigantic canyon made me feel almost light headed, looking down at the dazzling depths of the canyon made you wonder how one little river could create this. At Mather’s Point, two rainbows, side by side, penetrated the mist prevalent now throughout the canyon. It was very cool to see a double rainbow and my mom took many more pictures than necessary. It was hard to see the opposite bank because of the mist but it added to the otherworldly appearance, massive rock formations jutting up unevenly from the base and deep rivets pocketing the canyon. It was getting late and we were hungry so we headed back for dinner. Our site was very secluded and the sites very well spaced which I liked and dinner was Mac and Cheese with mashed potatoes, which I also liked. At 8 o’clock we went to a ranger program on the natives who lived here and how they survived in this harsh desert environment. It was very interesting and I learned a lot but we left at the hour mark because it had been another long day.